


at the top of my lungs in my arms

by polyside



Series: drift compatible as fuck [1]
Category: Polygon/McElroy Vlogs & Podcasts RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pacific Rim Fusion, M/M, POV Second Person, Past Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-18
Updated: 2019-10-18
Packaged: 2020-12-21 14:56:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21076763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/polyside/pseuds/polyside
Summary: They think that’s why you can’t drift properly anymore, but you know better. There’s nobody else in the world for you but Legs.





	at the top of my lungs in my arms

**Author's Note:**

> Whoo, RPF. It's been a minute (it's been over a decade) since I last posted real RPF but what can I say, I got inspired. This just kind of fell out of me with literally no regard for the actual rules of any aspect of the universe of Pacific Rim, and is unbeta'd as all my work is.
> 
> Back in the day we started every fic with a disclaimer and since I'm doing this RPF thing again I'm inclined to have one. In this case: if you are in the tags or personally know anyone in the tags, don't read this, go away, pretty please. Thanks.
> 
> I'm considering writing more in this universe - I have some ideas. We'll see if they go anywhere.

It’s been years, but Allegra’s ghost is still there.

They think that’s why you can’t drift properly anymore, but you know better. There’s nobody else in the world for you but Legs. You can get a little bit of the way there with Simone but it isn’t right, it isn’t perfect, you still feel how separate you are, with Simone on your right where she should be. Her voice drowns Simone’s out and you can’t risk it anymore, they can’t risk you anymore. You and Allegra were two of the best pilots together, but alone, you’re nothing. There’s no place in battle for you anymore when you can only drift with a ghost, you can’t pilot Jojo on your own (you asked, once, if you could just try, and you never want to see that much pity in Commander Long’s eyes ever again for the rest of your life). So, you’re shifted, and now you teach at the Academy that you once took by storm.

New recruits are always so excited to meet you that it breaks your heart, sometimes. There’s a girl, Jenna, so kind and soft, so different from Legs that you think it might work, but you’re not even close and she ends up a perfect fit for Simone, of course she does. So you get up every day and you spar with the kids, show them the right way to hold their arms and make a fist when it isn’t their own. Over time you start to pair them up, guided only by intuition, and nobody is more surprised than you are when your pairs are drifting together, better than any others.

That’s how you get landed with Brian David Gilbert.

He’d come to the Academy with his sister, the commander (call me Tara, she said once, and you’re trying but it feels like admitting your failure, even if it isn’t) tells you, but lost her, last year. Like you lost Legs. But he’s so young and he’s so talented (you’re so old and you’re so jaded) that she knows there’s another fit for him, and so he comes to your classes every day, eyes hopeful, waiting for you to find him a new partner. You get to know each other.

Brian is vibrant, chaotic, and yes, incredibly talented. When he fights it’s like watching him dancing (and he does dance, a lot, for fun, eyes alight until he reaches for a hand that isn’t there and chokes). Brian sings and dances, paints his nails in all colors of the rainbow, wears goofy outfits, and sometimes he looks at you with a smile that makes your heart flip over. He makes you laugh. You want him to make you laugh. You miss laughing with her as you moved together, you miss the dance of the fight when you moved as one, and Brian dances around you and makes you laugh and it almost feels like how drifting feels in your memories. When you’re with Brian you don’t hear Legs so loudly anymore; you only hear him.

Brian works decently with everyone. There’s Jonah, Karen, Susana, both Jenna and Simone, even Clayton who solo piloted his way back to the Academy when his partner was lost and for all that you can’t drift anymore, you thought Clayton was worse off, never envied him. It shocks you to realize that now, you do. You wonder what it would feel like to be compatible with Brian David Gilbert, to meet him in that ethereal space between worlds and. Well.

Drifting with Allegra was perfectly platonic. Your daydreams of drifting with Brian are…not. At night sometimes you think about that subconscious space and your body aches to share it with Brian, to have him touch you, move your hearts and bodies and minds as one - tonight you imagine leaving the drift and stumbling into each other, leaning down to catch Brian’s flushed lips with your own, folding his body into yours and that dream is the heaven of the drift you haven’t felt in years and years.

You’re an odd number for training the next day. You pair up with Brian for the first time since he joined your class. It startles you to realize - it’s been half a year, he's semi-compatible with everyone, but he’s still here, with you. He catches your fist as you strike, and you curse, you’re thinking too hard. He quirks an eyebrow and - bites his lip, smirks at you, and you think, damn, okay, why not. You shake your head affirmative and grin, and you let go, and you move.

You’ve never felt this free in a spar before, not even with Legs, every move you make he anticipates and you parry him right back. Time feels both slow and fast and you’re there, you’re perfect, you’re as high as you’ve ever been and as peaceful as stone, the world vanishes as you move to match Brian, he matches you back, you’re perfect, he’s perfect, and it feels like years pass in seconds as his mind stretches out before yours and you see everything, feel everything, pain and fear and sadness, the aching loss of Laura that rebounds into yours for Allegra, the close-but-not-there with Jonah, embarrassed separation from Clayton, and a want, a need, a desire that has haunted Brian’s (your) skin for months and you don’t, can’t turn away, you embrace it and you’re flying, you’re _drifting_, you’re _in the drift_ and Brian’s laughing and you’re laughing and you never want to come down.

You have to come down, but when you do Brian’s face is flushed (like you always dreamed it) and his hair is a mess and Simone cheers and you whirl around and holy shit, everyone is here, Clayton and Tara and even the McElroy brothers, Griffin smiling at you with that fond look he used to give you and Legs when you first came through the Academy. He claps you on the shoulder and his look says everything, pride and satisfaction and that affectionate older sibling you lost when you lost her and you don’t cry, you never cry, you didn’t even then but the tears start to come out, and they’re met by the tips of Brian’s fingers. Brian who brought you back to life again, who wraps his arms around you and rests his head on your shoulder like a perfect fit. You rest your fingers under his chin, tilt his head up and look into his eyes and you just know that tomorrow, with Brian on your left, there will be no ghosts to haunt your drift, only life and hope and the sparkle of Brian’s eyes as the last thing you see before you close yours and crush your lips to his.


End file.
